When WordPress welcomes new blogs to its platform, it posts a default “Hello World” post to get the aspiring blogger started. Ever wondered why?

“Hello World” programs are commonly used to teach fledgling programmers how to code. Their first assignments typically revolve around writing a simple program that prints “Hello, World!” on the screen, makes a nifty design, or something of the sort.

When I was a kid attempting to use my Commodore 64 as more than an Atari wanna-be, I remember being giddy at printing my name in a never-ending cascade of rainbow colors over and over again. That’s pretty much all I got that computer to do, besides play TrashMan for hours on end. I destroyed more joysticks on that game.

In my college years, Karel the Robot taught me the basics of CS — recursion, conditions, logic sequences. At the time, I hated Karel the f!@#$%ing robot with a passion. Mostly because whether Karel languished forever in that stupid maze I had to program him to find his way out of or not seemed to have very (VERY) little relevance to my shining future as a journalist. Yeeaaahhhh…..

So here I am now, after a single year as a professional journalist, 8 years at Intel in Internet Marketing and 4 at Netconcepts doing SEO. Thanks, Karel, it all makes sense now. Recursion rocks and life is full of conditions.

2 Comments on Hello, World! It’s Me, Web PieRat

Congrats on setting sail on the waves of ethernet. May the suns brighten your days, the stars guide you by night, and the wind always be behind your sails. Aye, and may your treasures always be bountiful.